If the plot of _The Revels of Orsera_ is a
little unsatisfying the elaboration of scenic description and mediaeval
pageantry is conscientious in the extreme, and the laughter which followed
the malicious pranks of _Gangogo_, the professional jester of the tourney,
must, if _I_ am to take the author's word for it, have made the glaciers
ring. There is a great deal in the way of philosophy and psychology that is
very baffling in this book, but of one thing I feel certain, and that is
that the Elemental Spirits of the Heights, to whom frequent allusion is
made, must find the winter sports of a later age a sorry substitute for the
rare old frolics of the fifteenth century.
* * * * *
It can at least be claimed for Mrs. MARGARET BAILLIE SAUNDERS that she has
provided an original setting and "chorus" for her new novel, _Becky & Co_.
(HUTCHINSON). Tales of City courtship have been written often enough, but
the combination here of a millinery establishment and a community of Little
Sisters of St. Francis under one roof in the Minories, gives a stimulating
atmosphere to a story otherwise not specially distinguished. _Becky_ was,
as perhaps you may have guessed, head of the millinery business, next door
to which was housed the firm of _Ray, St. Cloud & Stiggany_, leather-
dressers, the three partners in which all presently become suitors for the
hand of _Becky._ This in effect is the story--under which thimble will the
heart of the heroine be eventually found?--a problem that, in view of the
obviously superior claims of young _St.
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